-awaited mideast peace talks. >>> and, web trends. the sudden need to find facts about chocolate and lindsay lohan on the internet. it's friday, september 3rd. >> from abc news, this is "world news now." >> and it appears the biggest threat from hurricane earl, which is weakening thankfully, is the storm surge. not so much the wind gusts, as we maybe previously thought. but still, it's going to be there nonetheless. >> we've heard for days, at one point it was a category 5 storm, now a weak category 2 storm. so as things progress, hopefully it may not be as bad as folks feared. so that's the good news this morning. hi, everybody. i'm rob nelson. >> i'm mike marusarz sitting in for vinita nair. >>> north carolina is taking a pounding from hurricane earl this morning as the storm now begins to turn to the northeast away from land. >> earl is now located off the coast of cape hatteras, north carolina. t.j. winick is joining us from atlantic beach this morning. good morning, t.j. >> reporter: rob and mike, good morning to you both. even with a category 2 hurricane you're still talking about winds up t